Meditating
to suffer less
Updated Friday, February 6, 2009 at 14 h 30
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| Photo: The UdM researcher Joshua Grant |
Disciples of Zen meditation being less sensitive to pain than those who do not practice?
It seems so, show the work of PhD student Joshua Grant and Professor Pierre Rainville, University of Montreal.
This effect is also noticeable pain when the individual is not in a meditative state.
Zen meditation is a practice recognized by his followers to bring balance mentally, physically and emotionally.
Student Grant wanted to determine if the meditators had a different perception of pain compared to people who have never practiced meditation.
Previous studies have shown that patients with chronic pain could benefit from the practice of meditation, but few researchers have studied the resistance to pain in healthy subjects well trained in this practice.
- Joshua Grant
The researchers believe their work is a first step that determines how and why meditation affects the perception of pain.
study
Thirteen insiders meditation with a minimum of 1000 hours of practice have been tested for pain tolerance. Their responses were compared with those of thirteen other individuals who have never practiced meditation. The groups consisted of 10 women and 16 men aged 22 to 56 years.
tolerance test the pain was simple: a plate, at different temperatures, was pressed intermittently on the calves of the participants.
Initially at 43 degrees Celsius, the temperature was gradually raised to as high as 53 degrees Celsius, depending on the sensitivity of the subjects.
The results are clear: Many meditators have tolerated the maximum temperature, whereas no control subjects could not do.
This difference in reaction was even noticed when the meditators are not in state meditative.
Thus, the fact of practicing Zen meditation may be associated with a 18% reduction in pain.
Breathing in question
According to researchers, those who practice meditation reduce the sensation of pain through slower breathing. In comparison, they do 12 breaths per minute compared to 15 breaths per minute on average for other participants.
Slowing down breathing certainly seems to be a reduction of pain and may affect control of pain by relaxing the body.
- Joshua Grant
The results may also reflect an individual's ability to better control his thoughts and attention in relation to the concept of mindfulness (mindfulness ).
The details of this work is published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine .
http://www.radio-canada.ca/nouvelles/science/2009/02/06/001-douleur-meditation.shtml
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